Contact centers are often used to direct customer escalations (e.g., contacts) to various contact center resources (e.g., agents) based on a determination of the customer's question(s), the customer's needs, the availability of agents, the skills of agents, and so on. One specific type of contact center is known as a Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP) or E911 contact center.
PSAPs experience many unique problems not often encountered in a traditional contact center, usually because each contact in a PSAP is associated with an emergency. One problem that is more commonly experienced by PSAPs as compared to traditional contact centers is that the opportunity of language mismatches is heightened. Specifically, most traditional contact centers will first take a customer through an Interactive Voice Response (IVR) script during which language preferences/requirements of the customer can be ascertained. Usually by the time the customer has finished interacting with the IVR, the customer's language preferences/requirements are determined and the customer can be assigned to an appropriate agent. PSAPs, on the other hand, forego the IVR script and connect the caller with an agent as quickly as possible. As can be expected, if the caller and agent do not speak the same language, or if the agent is not capable of understanding the language spoken by the caller, then serious problems can arise.
Similar problems can arise if the caller is unable to speak intelligibly in any language. For instance, if the caller has suffered a stroke and is unable to speak intelligibly, then it will be very difficult to understand the caller, regardless of language preferences. As another example, if the caller is in a situation where they cannot speak for fear of endangering themselves, then there will be no opportunity to interact with the caller verbally.